Paging Sen. John Cornyn

I started to title this one ‘Looking for Mr. Goodbar’ but didn’t think the younger folk would get the meaning. Heck, maybe the older folk won’t. Every single time I try to write about Sen. John Cornyn, someone gets mad. I say good things, the grassroots peeps pile on. I say bad things, I lose so-called friends. Oh, and he and his staff get upset because they are so thin-skinned. Sometimes it’s hard to believe he’s been in politics as long as he has given his tendency to whine when someone says anything negative about him.

But here’s the deal: I like the guy as a Senator and think he’s done a lot of good things for Texas and the country. I’d go over a few of them but it wouldn’t matter – a large portion of the grassroots of the Republican Party of Texas does not like him and would not accept anything that I pointed out. They’d say he was a ‘squish’ or ‘has no backbone’ or ‘he’s an example of the Peter Principle’. So I won’t bother but if you care, you could always look at his lifetime conservative rating. I know, I know, you don’t care. I get it. He didn’t support Sen. Ted Cruz’s 21 hour speech (it wasn’t a filibuster, even you should accept that).

So we all know that the government is ‘shut down’ (now there’s a relative term) and it won’t reopen until Republicans achieve victory and Obamacare is defunded and sent to the trash heap of bad government programs. Of course the problem is that (a) there is no trash heap of bad government programs and (b) there is zero chance that Obamacare is defunded. The best that we can hope for is to come out of this with some type of ‘moral’ victory – what that looks like no one knows but if Republicans cave at this point and come away with nothing (delay, waiver, reduced cost, anything), then Republicans lose any hope of taking back the Senate.

Which, btw, was Sen. Cornyn’s strategy from the beginning. But because he failed to LEAD, he is now put in the position that people are talking seriously about Rep. Louie Gohmert challenging him in the primary. Lord help us but it is no one’s fault but Sen. Cornyn’s.

Sen. Cornyn could have been out front on this and stopped the government shutdown. He could have staged forceful speeches of his own, outlining his strategy. He didn’t and now we are where we are. I had one last glimmer of hope after a call with bloggers last week. One of the people on the call (sorry I didn’t catch the name) relayed to Sen. Cornyn that he was being portrayed as ‘betraying the people’ and he actually got angry. Listen:

If he would show that much passion about issues he’d be miles ahead right now. His long-term strategy of trying to win back the Senate is exactly what we need! Instead, he has been quiet (other than a thousand meaningless press releases). Why he is reluctant to fight for his strategy of taking the Senate back is incomprehensible. Recall that during last year’s Senate race, then candidate Ted Cruz said that it was more important that he won than it was that Republicans took over the Senate. That was BS then and it is BS now. But unless people are willing to fight that nonsense, it will rule the day.

Unfortunately, it is too late to focus on what should have been. Like I said, if Republicans cave at this point, all hope is lost. But there are still things that Republicans can do, and they should do, specifically Sen. Cornyn, even if it boosts Ted’s chances in 2016.

There is still time to do that. Sen. Cornyn should take a pair of bolt cutters to the World War II memorial and start removing the barricades. After all, there is probably no one in Texas politics that has done more for veterans. Let the Obama administration arrest him. Who cares? You have to fight to win at this point.

That kind of statement from someone of Sen. Cornyn’s stature would devastate Harry Reid and the Obama administration. But Sen. Cornyn has to realize that and stop thinking he is still a district judge in San Antonio.

Do you seriously want Louie Gohmert as your Republican nominee next year?